About the Author

Read a New York Times profile about Charles Portis, which describes his eluding of public life and his writing's characteristic deadpan humor: "Mr. Portis evokes an eccentric, absurd world with a completely straight face. As a result there are not a lot of laugh-out-loud moments or explosive set pieces here. Instead of shooting off fireworks the books shimmer with a continuous comic glow."

The Thicket, by Joe Lansdale
The Big Sky, by A. B. Guthrie
When the Legends Die, by Hal Borland
Far Bright Star, by Robert Olmstead
Shavetail, by Thomas Cobb
The Border Trilogy by Cormac McCarthy, start with All The Pretty Horses
The Son, by Philipp Meyer

Home on the Range: Tales from the Frontier

Roughing It, by Mark Twain
Death Comes for the Archbishop, by Willa Cather
Little House on the Prairie, by Laura Ingalls Wilder
Angle of Repose, by Wallace Stegner
A Sudden Country, by Karen Fisher

Classic and Not-so-Classic Westerns

The Virginian, by Owen Wister
Riders of the Purple Sage, by Zane Grey
The Collected Short Stories of Louis L'Amour
The Sisters Brothers, by Patrick DeWitt
Spoon, Robert Greer
Buffalo Girls, by Larry McMurtry
Deadwood, by Pete Dexter

Lawmen & White Hats: Featuring Texas Rangers and US Marshals

Lonesome Dove, by Larry McMurtry
Raylan, by Elmore Leonard

Revenge & Justice

Tenacious Heroines

Winter's Bone, by Daniel Woodrell
Salvage the Bones, by Jesmyn Ward
Once Upon a River, by Bonnie Jo Campbell
Bohemian Girl, by Terese Svoboda
The Passage, by Justin Cronin
In Calamity's Wake, by Natalee Caple

Nonfiction

Rooster: the Life and Times of the real Rooster Cogburn, the Man who Inspired True Grit, by Brett Cogburn